Aquatic Chemistry and the Human Environment

Abstract

Abstract The evident physical continuity in the cycles of water in air, soil, lake, river, estuary and sea is difficult to describe accurately; there is also a chemical continuity that is impossibly complex in detail but has unifying principles that need to be explored. Amid current somewhat myopic concern about the effects of certain toxic metals in the environment specifically in relation to man it is appropriate to reflect on the wider issues of aquatic chemistry that affect the human environment. These issues embrace the aquatic chemistry of the countryside and the health of the population and reciprocally the impingement of human activities on the aquatic realm. If one can demonstrate a coherent core of chemical principles there may also be an implied need for more enlightened co-ordination in the study of aquatic chemistry, its applications and developments. At present, fundamental chemistry, water and wastewater technologies, environmental chemistry and epidemiology are discrete provinces of aquati...